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UAL and pilots near concession agreement

[The following was emailed to me by a very reliable source. I cannot find this in any news releases as of 4:30 PM PST, however.] UAL and pilots near concession

Message 1 of 1
, Nov 1, 2002

[The following was emailed to me by a very
reliable source. I cannot find this in anynews releases as of 4:30 PM PST,
however.]

UAL and pilots near concession
agreement

Leaders of the pilots union at United Airlines are nearing a
tentative agreement on wage concessions and may decide Friday to schedule a
rank-and-file vote. Negotiators for the United chapter of the Air Line Pilots
Assn. (ALPA) and management hammered out most of the final details in a
conference call Thursday morning, just in time for a meeting of the union’s
regional leaders on Friday. Details have not been released, but sources close to
the union say pay cuts in the range of 18% to 20% are expected, about twice the
10% pay cuts the union agreed to earlier this year to help the financially
troubled carrier win a $1.8 billion federal loan guarantee.

The previous
plan was discarded after the Air Transportation Stabilization Board indicated to
United that it didn’t provide enough concessions to qualify for the financing.

United’s unions collectively agreed last month to $5.8 billion in
concessions over 5 ½ years, but talks with each union on its specific
contribution have taken longer than expected. However, a spokeswoman for the
Assn. of Flight Attendants, which has offered to take a 3.6% pay cut, says a
tentative deal could be reached very soon, “possibly over the weekend.”

A machinists union spokesman says talks are continuing, but there is no
word on when a deal might be reached. Time is growing short because the unit of
Elk Grove Township-based UAL Corp. faces debt payments of almost $900 million by
early December, and it will take at least two weeks for each union to conduct
rank-and-file votes once the unions reach tentative agreements with United.

United has said it is preparing to file for bankruptcy protection if it
can’t obtain additional financing with the help of the federal loan
guarantee

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